Isotopes Help Design Better Nutrition Programmes

Good nutrition is essential for good health. To ensure proper nutrition, energydense fat, protein and carbohydrates need to be accompanied by vitamins and minerals. Malnutrition is the result of too much food or too little food and a lack of variety in the kinds of food eaten. More than 30% of young children suffer from some form of malnutrition with devastating consequences for health, learning, future earning potential, economic development, resilience and security. Undernutrition in early life, when accompanied by excessive weight gain later in childhood, increases the risk of chronic diseases in adulthood. Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally, with at least 2.8 million adults dying each year from diseases related to overweight or obesity such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and some forms of cancer. Stable isotope techniques play an important role in the development and monitoring of interventions against malnutrition. Compared to other conventional techniques, these methods, which do not involve radiation, offer much more sensitive and specific measurements. They can be used to establish the ratio of lean tissue to fat in body composition; to estimate the number of calories spent each day; to determine whether breastfed babies are exclusively breastfed according to the recommendations issued by the World Health Organization (WHO); to assess a person's vitamin A reserves; and to establish how well iron and zinc are utilized from local foods and diets. This provides Member States with information to help them design or improve their national health and nutrition programmes.